11.30.2010

behold
behold
an ancient voice
is calling us
behold
behold
all over the sky
an ancient voice
is calling us
behold
behold

I have this song by Trish and Richard Bruxvoort where these lyrics from Black Elk repeat over and over again. I'm waiting for them to summon me into that deeper place that so often happens with Taize. I'm not singing though. I've listened it to a enough that I could know it by hear but I'd rather muse on the words that have been offered in this online adventure I'm making during Advent. Each day, an email arrives in my inbox. I read these words even before I get up to get my coffee. And each day it's the same question. Over and over again, I'm being asked where and how I've fallen asleep. I'm asked what it is that needs to be awoken.

And I have no clue. I was excited about this journey because I thought it might be a way to deepen my creativity. It would be another way to explore that inner artist that seems to want to awake -- but that's not it. That's not what's really asleep for me. There must be something else because all I really know is that I'm totally uncomfortable. (I receive daily affirmations from a friend's Advent journey which is truly helping to calm my nerves, but I'm still uncomfortable.) My back is tense. My body feels tired. I've been writing about this journey (a little) on my more public blog that church members read. But, I know there's something else. Something I need to say aloud so that someone else will hear it. I'm just not totally sure what that is. And then, tonight, I read this quote from Phil Cousineau's The Art of Pilgrimage. I haven't read it but I want to simply because he says this about pilgrimage:

Ancient wisdom suggests if you aren't trembling as you approach the sacred, it isn't the real thing. The sacred, in its various guises as holy ground, art, or knowledge, evokes emotion and commotion.

I am that emotion. In worship on Sunday, I couldn't stop trembling. I couldn't overcome my nerves -- which I found strange and confusing. I've served this church for 4 years. I've started taking some serious risks in worship. No one has died. On Sunday, I didn't do anything unique but I was scared. My body told me so even though my mind assured it didn't need to be frightened. "Do not be afraid," my mind said. My body rebelled. It was caught up in the terror and tremble that something was coming. Something big. Something that would change everything. Something that will make me move across the whole country. My paperwork was released today. I'm officially beginning a search for the next thing -- whatever God may bring. I knew that over the weekend. I knew that on Sunday. But, my head and my body weren't really on the same page on this matter. Now, I know it's that my relationship is changing with this community. I'm preparing to no longer be their pastor and I'm trying to understand who I am apart from this community. I'm trying to differentiate what is my ministry and what is their ministry. I'm trying to unravel myself from the work that I do to prepare for what is coming next. I'm trying to wake up to the fact that God is doing a new thing in me. It's strange that that is so uncomfortable. It seems impossible. But, there it is. I'm trying to awaken to myself this Advent. It wasn't in the music. It wasn't even in the words. It's in me.

11.18.2010

I'm getting a massage tomorrow. I feel like that says a lot about how I am emotionally, spiritually and physically. I really need this massage. My entire back is a knot. Thank you colleague on medical leave and ungrateful congregation who is driving me insane.

I went on a rant in my kitchen this week. Not to myself. I wouldn't tell you that here. This was to a friend who was over for dinner. She asked me about something else -- something related to the work we do (though she's not clergy) and I went off the deep end. I said lots of things about why I feel so disconnected from this ministry.

Thanks be to God. There is movement. Paperwork went to the Big Cheese (in our non-hierarchical tradition where the cheese just stinks) today. With God's abundant grace, we should be live soon. Like next week soon. And then, I can fantasize even more about leaving these people in the dust. I mean, I love them. They're just driving me nuts. We need some distance. Big time.